Who's Afraid of the Dark?

Halloween on Black Mountain was pretty boring. We never even had one until the year that new-fangled teacher, Mrs. Palmer, came. She was from Asheville and had it in her mind she'd save us kids from ourselves. All she did was give herself something she called migraines. But, she did learn us about Halloween. She told wonderful stories of how kids in Asheville wore costumes and knocked on neighbors' doors. With the magic of three words, "trick or treat", they got candy. The closest thing I had come to sweets was Mama's peanut brittle and I purely loved it. I told Mollie - she was my best friend since first grade - we ought to have us a trick or treat.

So, the year me and Mollie turned fourteen - Mollie was madly in love with two boys, Oshie Connor and Tyler Morgan - we decided Black Mountain needed some shaking up. We wanted us a real Halloween like those kids in Asheville, but there wasn't no way to go knocking on doors in the dark. I hated the dark. Folks were just too spread out. And, nobody had real store-bought candy at their house. So, we was plain stuck. Then, Mrs. Palmer got the idea to have a carnival with games, food, and ghost stories around a fire. I didn't much care for ghost stories.

"Where can we have a carnival?" Mrs. Palmer erased the board. I was right taken with her red fingernails even if the pastor had said it was a sign of the devil. "Could we have the carnival at the church?" Poor Mrs. Palmer just didn't get it.

"No, pastor won't go along with that. He says Halloween is the devil's night. He won't do a thing to help us." I didn't want her getting her feelings hurt.

Then, Mollie got that look in her eye. That look always meant some kind of trouble for me. "Let's have it at the Pritchard cabin."

My mouth just fell open. Now, she was messing with fire. The Pritchard cabin was haunted. Every soul on Black Mountain knew the ghost of Hobbs Pritchard - the meanest man that ever lived - could be seen on any given night standing by the old hollow tree in his yard. Him and his wife disappeared when I was a bitty thing. First Hobbs and then his wife. It was rumored one of his girlfriends got tired of his business and put him out of his misery. But, no one could figure what happened to his wife. No one ever saw either of them again. Mama said she'd of killed Hobbs if she married him, but that little wife of his didn't stand a chance.

"The old Pritchard place is haunted, Mrs. Palmer." I wanted her to know what she was getting into.

"Mary Carol, you don't believe in ghosts do you?"

I hung my head while Mollie giggled. "No."

"Good." She turned her attention to Mollie. "How do we get permission?"

"Just leave it to me, Mrs. Palmer." Mollie was such a teacher's pet.

"Good. We have lots of plans to make. What kind of games are we going to play?"

"How about bobbing for apples?" I thought that was a real fine game.

"That's a baby game. I want to play spin the bottle."

Mrs. Palmer looked shocked. "How do you play that game, Mollie?"

I was sure glad Mrs. Palmer didn't know how to play.

Mollie just hung her head. "I don't know. Patty's sister was talking about playing it with boys. I want games we can play with the boys."

I was sick of Mollie going ga ga over boys. "Let's carve pumpkins like you showed us, Mrs. Palmer."

"Excellent."

Mollie stuck her tongue out, but I knew she was full of envy and that is a sin.

Somehow Mollie convinced the old widow Pritchard to let us use her son's abandoned farm. The party grew until nearly the whole mountain planned on attending, even the pastor's wife, who said her husband could just stay home and be a stick in the mud. I offered Mama's peanut brittle. But, still in the pit of my stomach I wrestled fear. I hated ghost stories. Whenever Granny told them, I listened and never felt a bit of worry. It was always as I got in bed when the creeps crawled in with me. Many a night I slept with the covers over my head, even in the one-hundred degree heat.

Now, the way things turned out I had to walk to the party alone, thanks to my stupid brother Jim. He hated being stuck with his little sister and ran off early, leaving me with the supper dishes. Mama was down in her back and couldn't go, and Daddy, well, he had done drank himself into a dither and passed out on the floor. Granny couldn't walk across the room much less walk three miles up the road in the growing dark.

I gathered my peanut brittle and set out walking. I wasn't missing the party no matter what. The sun had set and the road got darker and darker. Jim took the only good lantern for his walk home. The harvest moon hung in the sky and lit my way with a smoky, gray light. I sure hated the dark.

The wind picked up some and I tried not to put much thought into my sweater left hanging on the rocker at home. I just moved forward one foot in front of the other, up that shadowy road. Then, I saw the dark place. It was a good quarter of a mile through some thick trees that hung over the road, blocking out the stars and the moon. I tried to think of ways to go around, but there just wasn't any unless I wanted to fight the briars or wade through the swamp. As I got closer, I started wishing I had me a friend or even an enemy to walk with. I wanted to kill Jim, and imagined ways to do just that.

Then, I heard a giggle. I swung around and a girl a little younger than me was following. She was right pretty with long, dark, curly hair. Fresh rosebuds hung from her ribbon. I found that a bit strange in October, but Granny's rose bush had bloomed as late as November. The girl wore a long old-fashion white slip like Granny wore when she was young. I saw pictures.

"Who are you?" She wasn't no one I'd ever seen.

"Kayleen Morgan."

"You're costume looks pretty good."

She giggled again. "It's just my burying clothes."

I thought she was trying to scare me, talking about such, but I was so relieved to have the company, I would have walked with the devil himself had he been there. "Are you going to the party?"

"I wish I could. I like parties. I went to a lot before."

We walked into the shelter of the trees. Now, what I noticed first about Kayleen was her eyes, the color of cornflowers, were not hidden in the dark. We walked.

"I used to be afraid of the dark. I thought spooks were around these parts."

"You ain't scared no more?"

"Ain't no reason to be."

I looked at this girl, younger than me and not a bit afraid, and shame just washed over me. "I'm scared of the dark. I can't help it."

"Ain't no reason. What gets you in the dark will get you in the light of day."

Kayleen looked at me and smiled. "You can hold my hand."

"No. I'm okay." I could have sworn she sighed, as if she were deeply disappointed.

"We're almost out."

"Yeah. We're coming to the creek."

"I'm scared of going to the Pritchard farm."

Kayleen stopped. "Why you scared?"

"That place is haunted!"

"I ain't scared of Hobbs. His wife put him in his place. She cut off his head and put it in that old hollow tree."

That sent a chill up my spine. "He's been dead too long for you to know him."

"He's a real ornery sort." Kayleen laughed.

"How did his wife die?"

We walked out of the trees into the moonlight, which seemed to shine right through Kayleen.

"Who told you that mess?" asked Kayleen.

"Everybody knows she died. They just don't know how."

"She ain't dead. Lord, she rode right out of here, free as a jaybird."

I started walking. "Hobbs Pritchard or his wife was never found. How you know all that stuff?"

"Just do." Kayleen hung back.

I walked across the little bridge. "You better come on or I'll leave you." But, when I looked back, the road was empty.

"Kayleen, you ain't a bit funny. You come on out." A dog barked in the distance. I ran.

When I got to the carnival, there was a big commotion. Not cause of the fun and games. I grabbed Mollie by the arm. "What's going on?"

"Where you been?"

"Stupid Jim left me with the supper dishes."

Oshie Connor yelled from across the yard. "Look what we found!"

"What they doing over there by that hollow tree?"

Mollie shrugged. "Charles Ray thought he saw the ghost of Hobbs Pritchard. Then, Tyler reached inside that tree, found a skull. You'd think them boys found gold."

The creeps walked right across my head like an army of ants. "What's a skull doing in there?" But, I knew the answer.

"They believe it belongs to Hobbs." Mollie looked bored.

When all the excitement was over and done with, a whole group of us walked home. Of course the boys tried scaring us, but it didn't bother me none. Mollie just giggled and tried to keep Tyler's attention.

Granny was rocking in her chair by the fire when I got home. I told her the boys found Hobbs Pritchard's skull.

"Now that don't surprise me a bit. There was always something fishy with that story."

I thought about Kayleen. "Granny, a girl I ain't never seen before met me on the road."

"Did folks know her at the party?"

"She didn't come. When I crossed the creek, she disappeared."

Granny's face got real still, like when she's mad or thinking hard. "She have a name?"

"Kayleen Morgan. Have you heard of her?"

Granny leaned back in her chair. "Lord be, you done been talking with a haint, Mary Carol. They can't cross water cause they're dead. Did she touch you?"

"No."

"Good, cause if a haint touches you, you're the next to die."

My mouth turned real dry.

"Kayleen Morgan was twelve when she got herself lost walking home from my Papa's farm. Died from a fall. It just broke my heart when they found her. Her lips were purple, but the worse thing was - that child hated the dark. I just couldn't imagine her dying alone in the cold and dark."

Black Mountain accepted that the mystery of Hobbs Pritchard was solved. It kind of left a hole in the old story, and the storytellers, like Granny, had to start telling a new version. Everyone figured Nellie, his wife, cut his head off. But where was she? How did she get away with it? Where did she go? Was she dead? Or, alive somewhere laughing at the whole lot of us? It was truly a mystery of the best kind. For a while, the boys took to hunting for the rest of the body, but they got bored and let the whole mess be. Mrs. Palmer left before Christmas. She couldn't handle our backwards way of thinking. I think she was just scared over finding that skull and all.

Me, I just made a promise never to walk alone on the roads after dark again cause I'd lived my own Halloween story.

© 2004 Ann Hite